(Bloomberg) -- Zambia’s state-owned power utility warned it may cease generating electricity at the Kariba dam by October because the nation’s worst drought yet is depleting water levels at the world’s largest artificial reservoir.
Zesco Ltd. is “working frantically” to avoid a shutdown at the Kariba complex, Managing Director Victor Mapani said Thursday. Hydropower makes up about 85% of Zambia’s generation capacity, and consumers already endure power cuts lasting more than 12 hours daily.
“We are not sleeping,” Mapani said at a briefing broadcast on state-owned ZNBC TV. But “running into October, we’re going to get the Kariba outage.”
Mining companies in Zambia, Africa’s second-biggest copper producer, have resorted to importing power from neighbors to cover a shortfall after Zesco in June asked them to reduce their normal use by about 40%. That’s increased production costs, as they try maintain output levels.
The Zambezi River Authority, an entity co-owned by the governments of Zambia and Zimbabwe, which manages the Kariba dam, allocated the two countries 16 billion cubic meters of water for power generation to be shared equally this year. That’s the lowest amount ever apportioned for electricity generation.
The level of water, which is used to power Kariba’s turbines — Zambia and Zimbabwe each have capacity to generate more than 1,000 megawatts of electricity — has plunged in the wake of the drought. Inflows from the Zambezi river are the lowest since 1995, and the reservoir had 10.6% of useable water left by July 29.
Zambia has an installed generation capacity of 3,777 megawatts with a peak demand of 2,400 megawatts.
The country is importing 410 megawatts and has negotiated an additional 218 megawatts to start rolling-in this month.
--With assistance from Matthew Hill.
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